SATURDAY: The signing is now official, tweets Rangers executive vice president of communications John Blake. Lohse will join Triple-A Round Rock on Sunday.
FRIDAY, 12:26pm: Lohse indeed agreed to a minor league contract, tweets Sherman. He can opt out of the deal on June 1, tweets Heyman.
12:08pm: The Rangers and veteran right-hander Kyle Lohse have agreed to terms on a deal, tweets MLB Network’s Jon Heyman. While Heyman doesn’t specifically state whether the contract is of the Major League or minor league variety, he’d tweeted earlier this morning that Texas was interested in a minor league deal with Lohse. Joel Sherman of the New York Post tweets that Lohse will receive a $2MM base salary and up to $1.5MM worth of incentives on the deal.
Lohse, 37, was said to have worked out for clubs last week. The Scott Boras client is coming off arguably the worst season of his career, having pitched to a 5.85 ERA with 6.4 K/9 and 2.5 BB/9 in 152 1/3 innings in the final season of a three-year, $33MM pact with the Brewers. However, Lohse’s velocity, strikeout rate, ground-ball rate and control were all fairly consistent with his numbers from previous seasons. Lohse did experience a dramatic spike in his homer-to-flyball ratio, however, and his strand rate and BABIP each trended in the wrong direction as we well. Those red flags notwithstanding, Lohse topped 198 innings in both 2013 and 2014, pitching to a combined 3.45 ERA in that time, so there’s reason to believe that he can still contribute some productive innings at the big league level once he gets up to speed.
The Rangers recently lost right-hander A.J. Griffin to the disabled list due to a shoulder injury, and it’s yet unclear how much time he’ll require on the shelf. Their rotation presently consists of Cole Hamels, Derek Holland, Martin Perez and Colby Lewis, although Holland has struggled quite a bit this season and Perez’s innings could be monitored by the team after he threw just 104 1/3 combined innings between Double-A, Triple-A and the Majors last season in a return from Tommy John surgery. Texas also has ace Yu Darvish on the mend from his own Tommy John surgery, and he could return to action late this month or in early June, as he’s on a minor league rehab assignment right now.
Idk why, but the thing on his tooth is cracking me up!
What purpose does that comment have? Just keep your thoughts to yourself.
He’s just making an observation. Don’t read it if you don’t care
Maybe he just wanted to point that out to other people to share a laugh with…
There’s no need to go out of your way to bash someone, just for sharing some light humor. We are all better than that…
So, as, legendary former Viking’s and Dolphins’ wide receiver, Chris Carter would say, “C’Mon Man.”
Cris*
Seems like a scary sign to me. Generally Boras brings his clients to locales where they have a decent chance to succeed when they are not top tier and just scrounging around for a job, this is just the opposite. Lohse signed at a place where he could be in for loads of trouble in this heavily tilted offensive stadium and his assortment of junk he throws with nothing over powering.
I wish him and the Rangers luck, just don’t know how well it’s going to work out for this year and beyond, which is generally how Boras looks at his temporary placements like this.
Look at the offensive numbers at Globe Life Park since the renovations in 2012, then tell me again about this “heavily titled offensive stadium”
Rangers haven’t had a player hit 40 HR’s since the renovations.
AGREED!!! Since they opened up the concourse behind home plate, the wind tunnel at the ballpark blows in Not out and home runs are Much harder to hit. Home runs are definitely harder to hit in Arlington than they are in Milwaukee that’s for sure!!!
Nice points, robidebd and thatdudetg!!
That is certainly some good tidbits of information that I was pretty unaware about.
General consensus, without looking it up, of the casual, non-Texas/AL West fan, is that Texas was and still is a pretty good to great hitter’s ballpark…
I am definitely not arguing with either of you, but I am curious if there are any stats that tell just how much the opening of the concourse effects fly balls hit in Texas’ stadium.
Or maybe something like a before and after of home runs hit before they opened it up, and after it was opened up…Although, several other factors would make that pretty hard to definitively say that the opening caused (X) number of fewer home runs…Specifically things like, Texas’ own line-up being better or worse for those given years, their opponents being better or worse, pitching being better or worse, etc.
Heck, even putting Moreland’s HR stats or HR/FB ratio, or Beltre’s stats or HR/FB ratio before and after it opened up would be hard to prove that it was the opening that effected things…Especially factoring in age progression, line-up construction, injuries, pitcher’s faced, etc. Also, the same case could be made for Holland’s or Colby Lewis’ HR’s given up or HR/FB ratio before and after….
But, I don’t think it would take such a controlled analysis of the stats to get a general idea of how it has effected HR’s hit in Texas’ home ball park…
I mean myself, personally, I’m just looking for a round about answer, or rough estimate of about how much opening the concourse up has effected fly balls hit there…
…Possibly there is a simpler answer out there…AND SADLY I just thought of this as I was typing lol…But maybe there is data collected before they opened it up about the average wind acceleration on the field, for the games played there. Also, maybe they have that same data out there for after the concourse has been opened up..
Either way, personally, it would just be a fascinating study to read how much of an effect it has had on players pitching and hitting in Texas’ home diamond…
Then again, I also find the construction of stadiums in general fascinating, and I’m curious as to how much input GM’s have towards the particulars when a new stadium is being built or major changes are being made…
For example, the way the Seattle Seahawks built their stadium. It was built and constructed purposefully to hold and trap in noise to make their home field advantage even greater…I mean, you have to give them credit where it is due.. It was such a smart, smart idea, so much so I’m suprised other teams haven’t copied their model for their own stadiums…Now, speaking of giving credit where it is due, regardless how a stadium is built…IT STILL TAKES an abundance of loud fans to set noise level records lol…So, Seachickens …I mean Seahawks fans have to receive ALOT of the credit for that in itself!! … (And my apologies to Seahawks fans out there, I’m a 49ers fan, and things are a bit gloomy right now, so please pardon my blatant jealousy haha lol)
But back to the subject at hand, stadium construction is a fascinating subject…especially baseball stadiums..I’m just curious whether a GM has any say in for example the ballpark dimensions, foul ground territory, things like the Rangers did opening up their concourse…And whether or not the GM makes those decisions based off of their current rosters…
Definitely something that would make an excellent write-up on…Unfortunately, I just don’t have the sources nor am I privied to any of that information…
Sorry for the length of these two novels fellow members lol, but maybe you all got some entertainment, or ideas, or you just wish to comment further on the topics previously mentioned..
Another contributing factor to Globe Life Park’s HR-heavy reputation is high air-temperature. That’s the conventional wisdom, anyway.
BravesFan88, I too am intrigued by this subject. If I’d had it my way, Globe Life Park’s center field office-building wouldn’t have been there (mainly in hopes that any incoming winds would’ve “knocked down” potential HRs). I hope the Rangers’ new ballpark (retractable-roof design) will have larger dimensions, especially at the RF & LF corners and the foul areas. A pitcher-friendly park would be nice after all these years of Arlington’s being Limburger cheese to top FA pitchers.
Very odd decision by the Rangers. Loshe was so awful with Brewers. Why give him another chance?
it’s a minor league deal with only a couple million guaranteed. With Griffin’s injury and Yu coming back from TJ, an extra arm with experience might pay off. If not…they move on. It’s not like they gave him a 5-year, 100 million guaranteed deal.